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<h1><a href="https://archiveofourown.org/works/27008221">Weapon</a> by <a class='authorlink' href='https://archiveofourown.org/users/treenahasthaal/pseuds/treenahasthaal'>treenahasthaal</a></h1>

<table class="full">

<tr><td><b>Category:</b></td><td>Star Wars - All Media Types, Star Wars Original Trilogy</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Genre:</b></td><td>Angst, Gen, Mention of Obi-Wan, Mention of Padmé, Nameless Planet, Suitless Darth Vader, a bit of hurt, duel, father vs son</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Language:</b></td><td>English</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Status:</b></td><td>Completed</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Published:</b></td><td>2020-10-14</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Updated:</b></td><td>2020-10-14</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Packaged:</b></td><td>2021-05-07 01:36:09</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Rating:</b></td><td>Teen And Up Audiences</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Warnings:</b></td><td>Graphic Depictions Of Violence</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Chapters:</b></td><td>1</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Words:</b></td><td>1,220</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Publisher:</b></td><td>archiveofourown.org</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Story URL:</b></td><td>https://archiveofourown.org/works/27008221</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Author URL:</b></td><td>https://archiveofourown.org/users/treenahasthaal/pseuds/treenahasthaal</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Summary:</b></td><td><div class="userstuff">
              <p>On a nameless planet, two foes duel.</p><p> </p><p>Written in response to a Tumblr Ask.</p>
            </div></td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Relationships:</b></td><td>Father and Son - Relationship, Luke Skywalker &amp; Anakin Skywalker, Luke Skywalker &amp; Darth Vader</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Comments:</b></td><td>4</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Kudos:</b></td><td>56</td></tr>

</table>

<a name="section0001"><h2>Weapon</h2></a>
<div class="story"><div class="userstuff module">
    
    <p>
  <span class="u"> <strong>Weapon</strong> </span>
</p><p> </p><p>
  <strong>Luke looked at Vader, seeing the man's icy blue eyes fixated on him. "Your father is not dead, Luke", he said, "I did not kill him". </strong>
</p><p>Panting from the effort of the duel, Luke took a step backward, his lightsaber wavering slightly at the unexpected mention of his father, a shiver of confusion rattled through him and he narrowed his eyes at the Sith Lord. </p><p>Vader saw the confusion, felt it. “Isn’t that what Obi-Wan told you? That I killed Anakin Skywalker?”</p><p>Luke shook his head, little droplets of sweat falling from his hair. “No,” he grated, finding his stance and lifting his sword. “It isn’t.”</p><p>Now it was Vader’s turn to feel confusion, to be caught off guard. “Then you know what happened to your father. You know who is at fault?” He stepped forward, lightsaber low, dragging it behind him and cutting a groove through the dirt.</p><p>Licking his lips, Luke stood his ground, refusing to yield any more ground. His eyes were fixed on Vader’s; so different just now to the red rimmed yellow that had stained them at the beginning of their fight. </p><p>They were blue now. So blue... </p><p>What did that mean? </p><p>“I know,” Luke told him, his voice wavering with exhaustion, emotion. “My father was at fault, my father chose his own path.”</p><p>Snarling in anger, eyes turning once more, Vader attacked. He gave no quarter, no mercy. Luke struggled to hold him off; taking all of his strength to maintain his grip of the hilt against the bludgeoning blows. He was beaten backward, feet sliding in the loose dirt of their battlefield. </p><p>He wasn’t just fighting against Vader and his brute strength, he was fighting his rising panic, his rising hopelessness. They had been wrong, they had put too much faith in him and his abilities, they had thought him ready to face the Sith, they had... </p><p>With a twist of his wrist Vader caught Luke’s blade with his own and tore it from his palm. With a step, with a pivot, Vader backhanded the young man sending him to the ground with a spray of blood, and a cry of pain and horror. When he turned over he found himself staring at the tip of Vader’s sword. Heat and light scorched his bruised and split face.</p><p>“Your father,” Vader was breathing heavily, rage searing his words, “was betrayed by those closest to him and...”</p><p>“Liar!” Luke roared back, pain and grief underscoring his words. He spat blood from his mouth. “Obi-Wan kept the temple recordings,” he told his foe with grief and distress. “I saw them,” he shouted. “I saw... I saw him kneeling to Palpatine. I saw him kill the children who looked to him for help! I saw what he did. I saw...”</p><p>“Luke...”</p><p>“Obi-Wan told me the truth,” Luke cried, tears mingling with sweat. “The Force...,” he gulped in air, gagged with fatigue and fright. “The Force told me it was the truth. I could feel it.” </p><p>He flinched as the blade shimmered and hummed centimetres from his face. He dragged his eyes away from the red, and glanced up hoping to see blue. </p><p>Yellow irises glared down, fired with ire and loathing.</p><p>Luke swallowed. “My father,” he said to those burning eyes, “was deceived.”</p><p>“By Obi-Wan,” the Sith sneered, “by the lies of the Jedi.”</p><p>“No,” Luke shook his head as the first patter of raindrops fell from the darkening sky and a distance thunder roiled the air. “By himself.”</p><p>“You were not there,” Vader scoffed, lips curling in scorn. “You do not know.”</p><p>Lightening flashed.</p><p>“But I was,” Luke screamed out in despair. “I was...” and quieter, “I was with my mother.”</p><p>Thunder crunched. Echoed.</p><p>Another flash and Luke could see hesitation and understanding crash home and again blue began to bleed into Vader’s eyes.</p><p>It began to rain in earnest and emboldened Luke pressed on. “All my life I heard the voices; the echoes of it all, in the Force.”</p><p>The sword wavered, moved back.</p><p>“I heard my father, I heard his urgency to save my mother, his desire to be free. I heard my mother; I felt my mother. I felt her...”</p><p>“You felt...” and was there horror in Vader’s voice? “... No... You were unborn. Unaware...”</p><p>“I have always been strong in the Force, like my father. Even within my mother’s womb the Force was with me.” The ground was turning to mud beneath him, he shivered with cold, with fading adrenalin. </p><p>“You lie!” It was feeble denial. </p><p>“No. Even Sith can sense the truth, no matter how much they wish to deny it!” His voice was raised, fighting against the growing storm. “I grew up with the dreams... Obi-Wan... Obi-Wan had to help me, had to teach me to make sense of them.” He glanced away then, blinking rain from his eyes, remembering. “Dreams of fluid warmth, of dull voices, of feelings of love and security and then...” his voice choked, he grimaced, and looked back up at the Dark Lord towering over him. </p><p>“I felt everything. I felt everything my father did and yet...” he hesitated, blue eyes on blue, “...my mother died loving my father. My mother died with the hope of there being good within my father still.”</p><p>The blade retracted, deactivated. Hair dripping wet, Vader stared down at the boy at his feet. The boy was right, even a Sith could not deny the truth. “Then your mother was a fool.”</p><p>There was something about that reproach that gave Luke hope and he smiled. “You know she was not.”</p><p>Luke was unsure what he saw within those blue eyes and on that pale face as the light flickered and flashed and as the thunder rumbled... </p><p>
  <em>regret?</em>
</p><p>
  <em>remorse?</em>
</p><p>
  <em>love?</em>
</p><p>...but it lifted his heart and banished his fear.</p><p>Grunting with effort Luke picked himself up from the mud and stood unarmed in the rain before the Sith Lord.</p><p>“No,” Vader agreed, finally, “she was not.” </p><p>He regarded the boy, taking in the blue eyes, the cleft chin. He was so like his father in many ways, and so like <em>her</em> in many more. Luke’s life had not been the easiest; moved from place to place, hiding and running with the last of the Jedi, and always with the Empire and its Inquisitors on their trail. </p><p>Luke sang with the Force; his presence was like no other he had ever sensed. Luke radiated light and goodness. Luke radiated power, and Vader suddenly understood what Qui-Gon, all those years before, had seen in him as a child; what Palpatine had seen and coveted in Anakin Skywalker, for he coveted Luke and the Sith’s entire being longed to just reach out for the boy and take him. However, he knew that was the wrong approach given their battle, Luke would never accept that, would never join him.</p><p>He nodded at the youth. “Tell Obi-Wan he has crafted a fine weapon.”</p><p>Luke quirked his head, frown lines creased his brow. He shook his head, wiped rain, mud and blood from his face with the back of his hand. “No,” he said, simply. “I am a Jedi,” and he nodded in Vader’s direction, “like my father before me.”</p><p>Luke lifted his arm, reached out his hand, and offered his father an open palm.</p><p>ooOOoo</p><p>end...</p>
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